despatched to the duchess to let her grace know that circumstances
had occurred which had rendered it impossible not to _ask the
Clonbronies_. An excuse, of course, for not going to this party, was
sent by the duchess--her grace did not like large parties--she would
have the pleasure of accepting Lady St. James's invitation for her
select party on Wednesday, the 10th. Into these select parties Lady
Clonbrony had never been admitted. In return for great entertainments
she was invited to great entertainments, to large parties; but further
she could never penetrate.

At Lady St. James's, and with her set, Lady Clonbrony suffered a
different kind of mortification from that which Lady Langdale and Mrs.
Dareville made her endure. She was safe from the witty raillery,
the sly inuendo, the insolent mimicry; but she was kept at a cold,
impassable distance, by ceremony--"So far shalt thou go, and no
further," was expressed in every look, in every word, and in a
thousand different ways.

By the most punctilious respect and nice regard to precedency, even
by words of courtesy--"Your ladyship does me honour," &c.--Lady St.
James contrived to mortify and to mark the difference between those
with whom she was, and with whom she was not, upon terms of intimacy
and equality. Thus the ancient grandees of Spain drew a line of
demarcation between themselves and the newly created nobility.
Whenever or wherever they met, they treated the new nobles with the
utmost respect, never addressed them but with all their titles, with
low bows, and with all the appearance of being, with the most perfect
consideration, anything but their equals; whilst towards one another
the grandees laid aside their state, and omitting their titles, it was
"Alcala--Medina Sidonia--Infantado," and a freedom and familiarity